1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is generally directed to optimizers in database management systems, and more particularly directed to left and right outer join optimization.
2. Background Art
A query optimizer is a component of a database management system that attempts to determine the most efficient way to execute a query. If properly designed and implemented, query optimizers can significantly increase the efficiency of DBMS query processing.
Left and right outer joins are well known SQL constructs. Left and right outer joins are often useful, but are computationally expensive to process. Accordingly, there is a need for improved techniques in query optimizers for optimizing and processing left and right outer joins.